Chris J. Davis

Biography

Program Director

NOIRLab, Galactic Astronomy

Division of Astronomical Sciences, Directorate of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, Natrional Science Foundation

Dr Chris J. Davis is an astronomer currently working for the National Science Foundation, Division of Astronomical Sciences, in Alexandria, Virginia. His main role is oversight of NSF’s National Optical-Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory (NOIRLab) which operates telescopes in Arizona, Hawai’i  and Chile. Prior to his move to the metropolitan D.C. Area, Davis spent three years in England where he acted as Astronomer-in-Charge of the Liverpool Telescope, a fully robotic 2-meter diameter telescope in the Canary Islands that specializes in delivering high-impact results in time-domain astronomy. In 2011 and 2012 Davis spent 20 months on secondment at NASA Headquarters in Washington D.C., where he acted as Discipline Scientist for infrared astronomy and Program Scientist for the SOFIA airborne observatory. Before this he spent almost 14 years in Hawai’i where he was employed as a Support Astronomer at the United Kingdom Infra-Red Telescope. Davis' research interests include infrared and sub-millimeter studies of star forming regions, outflows and jets from young stars, young stellar variables and transients, Galactic Plane surveys, stellar evolution, and proto-planetary nebu